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Monday, April 1, 2013

BAM announces the world premiere of Baby Einstein on the Beach

BAM is pleased to announce that the producers of this fall’s Next Wave Festival will partner with their colleagues in BAM Education to present Baby Einstein on the Beach, drawing a super cast of toddler talent including an advanced Baby Mozart violinist culled from an international audition, as well as the most magnetic Brooklyn kids representing the borough and its tireless parents. Several shifts of children will populate each five-hour performance. In keeping with the original vision of creators Robert Wilson and Philip Glass, wherein the audience is encouraged to get up and move about, the cast itself will grab snap-naps as necessary on the stage as the floor is custom fabricated with cushioned rubber matting.

Dovetailing the avant-garde mission of Next Wave with the curriculum of BAM Education, Glass' hypnotic score proves a natural tool for teaching kids how to count and concentrate seriously while doing so. (By the end of workshopping, frustration-induced crying outbursts were nearly nonexistent.) Choreography by the cutting-edge kids' dance company Lucinda's Child deftly mixes kids' natural instincts for skipping back and forth relentlessly, until the point of exhaustion. As with the original production, Baby Einstein blurs the boundary between monotony and transcendence. White make-up meant showtime, not playtime; those innumerable face-painting expeditions (sans tiger stripes) really paid off.

BAM Executive Producer Melillo said: "BAM is thrilled to present the youngest ever cast of Einstein. The addition of regular bouts of adorable yawns was more than I'd hoped for." The show is directed by Benjamin Lyons, a veteran of avant-garde children's theater and performance art and former off-Broadway child star.

Tickets go on sale in two weeks. Please note, no children under one-and-a-half years old permitted without adult accompaniment.